Taxation

Deducting home purchase savings contributions

Taxpayers may deduct certain expenses from their taxable income. These expenses include contributions paid under a home purchase savings plan which are tax deductible under certain conditions.

The purpose of a home purchase savings plan is to enable a subscriber to receive a loan on favourable terms for the financing of their personal home, in exchange for the payment of contributions.

The contract must be taken out to finance the construction, acquisition or transformation of an apartment or house used for personal housing needs, including the acquisition price of the land.

Home purchase savings contributions are considered to be special expenses (dépenses spéciales - DS).

Who is concerned

Both resident and non-resident taxpayers treated as resident taxpayers can deduct the home purchase savings contributions as a special expense, including the interest income for the home purchase savings contract.

Prerequisites

Conditions under which contributions paid are deductible

Contributions paid under a home purchase savings plan are deductible only if:

they are paid into an approved home purchase savings institution in Luxembourg or another EU Member State (banks, credit institutions and other financial institutions are excluded). Only 3 home purchase savings institutions are currently approved in Luxembourg:

the home purchase savings contracts were entered into to finance a building used for the taxpayer's personal housing needs (construction, acquisition, transformation of a building or acquisition of land to build a home), and;

their purpose is the financing a main residence.

The highly specific scheme for home ownership savings institutions differs from that of banking and financial institutions. The latter cannot claim the benefit of the legal provisions concerning home savings (111 LIR) for their products.

Savings accounts called "plans d'épargne-logement" (PEL), for example, are not eligible for tax deductions. The terms of this type of savings plans do not fall under the specific conditions referred to in Luxembourg law.

Specific conditions for non-resident taxpayers

Condition of allocation of funds

As of the 2017 tax year, regardless of the date of subscription of the contract, the funds resulting from a cancellation of a home-savings plan or from the granting of the savings at the end of the plan must be used to finance a building used for the taxpayer's personal housing needs (construction, acquisition, transformation of a building or acquisition of land to build a building).

How to proceed

Treatment of home savings contributions

The duration of the contract has exceeded 10 years

If the duration of the home-purchase savings contract has exceeded 10 years, contributions remain deductible.

Failing to use the capital received to finance a building used for the taxpayer's personal housing needs (construction, acquisition, transformation of a building or acquisition of land for the purpose of constructing a building), a deduction for special expenses of contributions paid to a home-savings savings institution is no longer permitted from the tax year following receipt of the capital.

The duration of the contract has not exceeded 10 years

Termination of the contract

The taxpayer who cancels the home savings plan before the 10 years have elapsed (date of the allocation of the funds) cancels the deductible nature of the contributions paid, meaning that the contributions already deducted are considered to be non-deductible.

The taxpayer therefore becomes subject to a corrective taxation, which will be to his disadvantage.

This corrective taxation is applied to all the contributions which have been wrongly deducted.

Moreover, failing to use the capital received to finance a building used for the taxpayer's personal housing needs (construction, acquisition, transformation of a building or acquisition of land for the purpose of constructing a building), a deduction for special expenses of the contributions paid to the home-purchase savings institution is no longer permitted from the tax year following receipt of the capital.

There are, however, certain circumstances which prevent the imposition of a corrective tax from taking place and which maintain the right to deduction, for example:

death;

incapacity for work, etc.

Allocation of savings

Contributions remain deductible and the taxpayer retains the right to deduct if the savings are used for:

the acquisition of a dwelling intended to be used for the personal housing needs; or

the repayment of the loan financing the dwelling intended to be used for the personal housing needs; or

If the duration of the contract has not exceeded 10 years and the saver uses the money received to finance a car or a kitchen:

the contributions lose their deductible character and a corrective tax to the disadvantage of the employee will be levied; and

a deduction for special expenses of contributions made to a home-purchase savings institution is no longer allowed from the tax year following receipt of the capital.

Deductible amount

From 2017, the maximum deductible amount is set according to the age of the youngest of the adult subscribers:

from 18 to 41 years old: EUR 1,344;

over the age of 41 years: EUR 672 euros.

The higher deductible amount also applies in the calendar year in which the subscriber turns 41.

This amount can be increased by its own amount for:

jointly taxable spouses or partners;

each child for which the taxpayer obtains a tax reduction for children.

Example

"A" and "B" are subject to joint taxation. "A" turns 41 during the tax year. "B" is 50 years old. "A" has a home purchase savings plan. They have 3 children for whom they are entitled to a tax reduction. They can deduct: 5 x 1,344 = EUR 6,720.

"A" and "B" are subject to jointl taxation. "A" turns 41 during the tax year. "B" is 50 years old. "B" has a home purchase savings plan. "A" does not. They have 3 children for whom they are entitled to a tax reduction. They can deduct: 5 x 672 = EUR 3,360.

Deduction of contributions paid

To deduct home purchase savings contributions as special expenses (DS):

the resident or non-resident treated as a residenttaxpayer can submit an income tax return and indicate the amounts paid on page 14 of the income tax return (form 100); or

Supporting documents

The taxpayer can justify the annual amount of deductible contributions paid during the fiscal year concerned as special expenses (SD) by providing a copy of the annual statement produced by the home purchase savings institution.

The Luxembourg Inland Revenue reserves the right to request additional supporting documents as part of the process of verifying any information, statements, applications, declarations, claims or appeals submitted to its offices.

Forms / Online services

To complete your application, the information about you collected from this form needs to be processed by the public administration concerned.

That information is kept by the administration in question for as long as it is required to achieve the purpose of the processing operation(s).

Your data will be shared with other public administrations that are necessary for the processing of your application. For details on which departments will have access to the data on this form, please contact the public administration you are filing your application with.

Under the terms of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, you have the right to access, rectify or, where applicable, remove any information relating to you. You are also entitled to withdraw your consent at any time.

Additionally, unless the processing of your personal data is compulsory, you may, with legitimate reasons, oppose the processing of such data.

If you wish to exercise these rights and/or obtain a record of the information held about you, please contact the administration in question using the contact details provided on the form. You are also entitled to file a claim with the National Commission for Data Protection (Commission nationale pour la protection des données), headquartered at 1, Avenue du Rock'n'Roll, L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette.

By submitting your application, you agree that your personal data may be processed as part of the application process.

To complete your application, the information about you collected from this form needs to be processed by the public administration concerned.

That information is kept by the administration in question for as long as it is required to achieve the purpose of the processing operation(s).

Your data will be shared with other public administrations that are necessary for the processing of your application. For details on which departments will have access to the data on this form, please contact the public administration you are filing your application with.

Under the terms of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, you have the right to access, rectify or, where applicable, remove any information relating to you. You are also entitled to withdraw your consent at any time.

Additionally, unless the processing of your personal data is compulsory, you may, with legitimate reasons, oppose the processing of such data.

If you wish to exercise these rights and/or obtain a record of the information held about you, please contact the administration in question using the contact details provided on the form. You are also entitled to file a claim with the National Commission for Data Protection (Commission nationale pour la protection des données), headquartered at 1, Avenue du Rock'n'Roll, L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette.

By submitting your application, you agree that your personal data may be processed as part of the application process.